Marcia Angell: US health care held hostage to corporate profit -- single payer is the only answer

[nichomachus]

Dr. Angell is former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine.

The Senate Finance Committee's hearings on health reform earlier this month did not include testimony from any advocate for single-payer insurance. Physicians for a National Health Program, which represents 16,000 doctors, asked the committee to invite me to testify, but it chose not to. If I had been invited, this is what I would have said:

The reason our health system is in such trouble is that it is set up to generate profits, not to provide care. We rely on hundreds of investor-owned insurance companies that profit by refusing coverage to high-risk patients and limiting services to others. They also cream off about 20 percent of the premiums for profits and overhead.

In addition, we provide much of our medical care in investor-owned health facilities that profit by providing too many services for the well-insured and too few for those who cannot pay. Most physicians are paid fee-for-service, which gives them a similar incentive, particularly specialists who receive very high fees for performing expensive tests and procedures. Nonprofits behave much like for-profits, because they must compete with them. In sum, healthcare is directed toward maximizing income, not maximizing health. In economic terms, it's a highly successful industry, but it's a massive drain on the rest of the economy.

The reform proposals advocated by President Obama are meant to increase coverage for the uninsured. That is certainly a worthwhile goal, but the problem is that they leave the present profit-driven and highly inflationary system essentially unchanged, and simply pour more money into it - an unsustainable situation.

....

A single-payer system is ignored by lawmakers because of the influence of the health industry lobbies. They raise the specter of rationing and long waits for care. There are indeed waits for some elective procedures in some countries with national health systems, such as the United Kingdom. But that's because they spend far less on healthcare than we do. For them, the problem is not the system; it's inadequate funding. For us, it's not the funding; it's the system. We spend more than enough.

I urge you to consider a nonprofit single-payer system. The economic interests of the health industry should not be permitted to hold the rest of the economy hostage and threaten the health and well-being of the public.

On edit -- sorry -- here's the link:

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2009/05/23/held_hostage_by_the_health_system/

[RufusTFirefly]

1. Why should we listen to a doctor??

I mean, what does she know about health care?

When I need medical advice, I always ask an insurance agent or a salesperson from the pharmaceutical industry. You know, someone I can trust.

[rocktivity]

3. DUzy!

And I'm placing a link to the story on my company's web site.

:headbang:
rocktivity[/b}

[drm604]

2. K&R

Off to the greatest page!

[snowdays]

4. Baucus refused to have her testify. SHAMEFUL

[glitch]

6. They're proud of their shame. They brag about it to each other and their lobbyists

over drinks. And laugh and laugh! Satan hears their laughter, and smiles.

[snowdays]

7. and Grassley and Baucus yelled. WE NEED MORE POLICE as they laughed.

[glitch]

8. I hope I never become so disconnected from humanity that I could laugh at honest people fighting to

bring relief to the suffering.

That disconnection seems like hell on earth to me.

[snowdays]

11. its only

hell on earth for the people involved--not for the ones sitting at the table.

And you are right. It is a disconnection that is so vivid to many of us but congresscritters like Grassley and Baucus it is not. We are just invisible.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

25. when he comes up for re-election, the video of him mocking Dr.s, Nurses, Activist

will be played over and over.

And his having the same people arrested.

[snowdays]

5. REC and thanks for posting.

[Pooka Fey]

9. K&R

[SeattleGirl]

10. Having health insurance companies and drug companies be publicly

traded entities is, in my opinion, ethically and morally wrong.

Health insurance companies should be concerned with paying for the cost of helping people become healthy, or keeping healthy people healthy, not lining the pockets of stockholders.

[vssmith]

12. Maybe liberal organizations should start putting TV ads in Montana

[BREMPRO]

13. one of the best arguments i've read for single payer- and from a credible witness...

I'm pissed she wasn't allowed to testify. WTF!!
congress needs to grow some courage and fight for the best interests of the people, not the obscene profits of the insurance,HMO and drug industries. Democracy is not a spectator support- CONTACT your congressperson and senators and let them know you want single payer. We need to fight for what is right!!!

[Vinca]

14. Here's another reason single payer makes sense.

If they pass a Massachusetts-style "universal" insurance plan, there will be fines for people who still cannot afford coverage. There will need to be an entirely new enforcement agency in the government - the insurance police - to track down those who don't purchase insurance so they can be fined. In addition, these same people (and I imagine they would be in the millions) will continue to use the ER for primary care and the end result is those who pay insurance premiums will still be footing the bill for those without. The only way to cover everyone is single payer and when it all shakes out, it would be much more affordable.

[Greyhound]

22. And if they cannot afford to pay the fine it is now a crime and they can be sentenced to

jail or "community service". Voila, the return of the hallmark of Victorian England and the good old days, debtors prison.

[lonestarlib]

15. WTF!!! Health Industry's Lobbyist is a Democrat!

and former union official Karen Ignagni.

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics/AP/story/1063442.html

[Selatius]

21. There is a revolving door, often times, between Democratic lawmakers and lobbyists.

If the money is good, there is always someone in the ranks who will sell out.

[Overseas]

16. K&R !!

We've had decades of stalling from the for-profit medical insurance industry. Enough is enough.

Single payer now!

Give us the basic single payer universal coverage, and the insurance companies who have leaders worthy of being paid millions of dollars a year will find ways to offer supplementary services. They've proven that they can take care of themselves.

Let's give the 46 million uninsured (and the millions more under-insured like me) what they need for a change.

[diane in sf]

17. I really feel that providing single payer health care is the next civil rights battle.

[Raksha]

19. The next civil rights battle - I think you're right!!!

[Enthusiast]

18. K&R We might as well fight THIS

particular fight right now because corporate government bullshit is no longer tolerable.

[Selatius]

20. It will take something approaching Civil Rights Movement proportions to enact single-payer.

These corporations are damned resistant to anything that would put care over profits for them. The only enemy here is greed.

[Greyhound]

23. The enemy here is the class war that they have waged for over a century.

They freely admit it and we refuse to acknowledge it.

Is it any wonder they view us with such contempt?

[Bread and Circus]

24. Dr. Angell is spot on....especially this....

A single-payer system is ignored by lawmakers because of the influence of the health industry lobbies. They raise the specter of rationing and long waits for care. There are indeed waits for some elective procedures in some countries with national health systems, such as the United Kingdom. But that's because they spend far less on healthcare than we do. For them, the problem is not the system; it's inadequate funding. For us, it's not the funding; it's the system. We spend more than enough.

....

hammer, meet nail...

[Uncle Joe]

26. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, nichomachus.

[L0oniX]

27. R & K

[Riverman]

28. Bill Moyer did an excellent show on PBS TV Sat night.

The consistent reason given by those he interviewed - two docs, and a rep of the Cal Nurse Assoc - who went bankrupt when her husband and she got sick and their insurance was not enough to cover the total medical cost - all said the only reason that single-payer is not even allowed to be discussed in the Congress, by the White House and the main media is the medical insurance industry and their lobbyist. They went on to day that even if a compromise Health Care Plan is adopted now or in the future that includes the health insurance industry, it will fail and single-payer will eventually be passed. They cited Taiwan who recently gave up on private health insurance and crated a hybrid single-payer plan similar to the Canadian plan but with private medical doctors and hospitals which is basiscally plans submitted in bills submitted to Congress by Senator Sanders (I-Vt) and Congressman Conyers (D- MI).

[mzmolly]

29. To the greatest.

I have much respect for Dr. Angell.

[quidam56]

30. Couldn't have said it better if I tried.

Health care has gone the way of Wall street and sadly patients and people don't matter. Profit Care comes ahead of Patient Care. I support HR 676. I know from experience what is deemed, defended and supported in East Tennessee and southwest Virginia as "THE ACCEPTABLE STANDARDS OF CARE". It's on record in Greeneville, TN Federal Court case no. 2:04-cv-375, nothing at all like the snake oil merchants are selling... http://www.wisecountyissues.com/?p=62 Hospitals and emergency rooms are breeding MRSA ( Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureaus ). If you've not heard of it, you will, it's the next AIDS. It's in our schools, homes, churches, businesses and restaurants yet we can't figure out how a "hospital acquired" infection was getting into our communities when people who are dying from MRSA complications never stepped foot into a hospital or emergency room. The very health care system we are misled to trust is killing us.